


Under Your Skin

by PalmettoFoxDen



Series: Andreil Body Swap [1]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Bodyswap, M/M, Raven Neil Josten
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-21
Updated: 2019-03-21
Packaged: 2019-11-26 16:41:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18183128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PalmettoFoxDen/pseuds/PalmettoFoxDen
Summary: Andrew is going into his second year as a Palmetto State Fox. Neil is starting his first year as an Edgar Allan Raven since he was found by his father and sold to Tetsuji Moriyama, as he was supposed to be before he and his mother ran away so many years before.Andrew and Neil wake up in each other's bodies. Andrew doesn't understand how he ended up at Evermore, why he looks like Neil Josten with blue instead of brown, or why everyone keeps calling him Nathaniel Wesninski when his jersey says Josten. Neil doesn't understand how Aaron and Nicky can't tell him apart from their own family.Andrew and Neil think it is over when they wake up in their own bodies the next morning, but things are just getting started. They're going to have to learn to trust each other if they are going to make it through this with their secrets safe and if Andrew is going to succeed at keeping the promise he made to escape the Nest as Neil and bring Kevin with him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **A/N: Art for this fic is by the lovely and talented[uzea-ke](http://uzea-ke.tumblr.com/) and this fic was beta read by [sunshineandkitties](http://sunshineandkitties.tumblr.com/).**
> 
> **I would love to know what you think of this fic and I'm posting it all at once so please consider letting me know what you think about different parts of the story!**

****

**Monday**

Neil woke up in a cold sweat to the sound of other voices. They were not the familiar voices of his teammates and, somehow, that was even more unsettling than when he awoke to the unpleasant realization that he was not alone with his roommate Jean.

His eyes flashed around the unfamiliar room. He had no idea where he was, but judging by the white walls and windows the answer was nowhere near the Nest. Escaping the Nest should have felt freeing, but it was hard to feel free when you were trapped in a room with strangers and had no idea how you got there. He worried that his father had changed his mind about sparing him and that his men had grabbed Neil so that he could clean up the mess. Neil had run away from him with his mother the first time that his father had tried to sell him, and he lived in constant fear of his father getting out of jail and showing up at the Nest to eliminate Neil before he could share any of his knowledge about his father and his crimes with anyone.

The two men that stood in the centre of the room were dressed in pajamas and looked like they were still half asleep. They did not seem surprised when Neil jolted awake. They just gave him a half glance like this was perfectly normal and went back to their conversation.

Neil recognized them. He had not met them personally before but he knew of them. The tall one with the dark skin was Nicky Hemmick, and the short one with the light skin was either Aaron or Andrew Minyard. Judging by the lack of the ominous smile and armbands that Andrew was famous for, it was probably Aaron, although it wouldn’t be overly surprising if Andrew wasn’t wearing armbands first thing in the morning.

Neil didn’t know where the other twin was. He didn’t know why he was here. It didn’t really make sense for them to be working for his father. They played for the lowest of the low teams and had no reason to be connected to Nathaniel Wesninski or the Moriyamas. Neil wondered if he had been sold to the Foxes, but he did not think that they could afford to buy good players considering the size of their team roster.

“I don’t see the point of getting up this early,” Nicky complained. “Our team sucks anyway. Do we really need to lose sleep practicing sucking?”

“Maybe if we’re lucky a fight will break out and Coach will cancel the rest of practice again,” Aaron said.

Neil stared at them with his heart pounding in his chest. He felt sick to his stomach.

“What the hell is going on?” he questioned.

The cousins looked a little surprised now as they turned their attention on Neil.

“Practice. Just like every morning,” Aaron deadpanned. “Get up. I’m not running laps because you wouldn’t get the fuck up and made us late.”

“I’m supposed to go to a Fox practice?” Neil asked. “Why?”

“You’re the one who decided we were signing to this team, Andrew,” Nicky pointed out. “You have to at least show up.”

“It’s not like anyone expects you to try anyway,” Aaron grumbled on his way out of the room.

_ Andrew. _

Why had Nicky called him Andrew? He was Nathaniel Wesninski in the Nest and Neil Josten in public. How could Nicky not tell the difference between him and his own cousin?

Neil glanced down at his hands and was startled as he saw his arms were covered with black armbands like the ones Andrew Minyard always wore. His hands were shaking. His arms didn’t look like his arms. They were wider and more muscular and  _ wrong _ .

Neil sprung from the bed and out of the bedroom. Aaron already had the bathroom door open and was just stepping inside so at least Neil didn’t have to search the whole dorm to try to track down a mirror.

“What the fuck, Andrew?” Aaron grumbled as Neil shoved past him and slammed the door in his face.

Neil locked the door and leaned against it with his eyes shut, taking a moment to brace himself before looking in the mirror. This all felt like some horrible nightmare.

Still, when he opened his eyes and stepped in front of the mirror, he did not expect to see Andrew Minyard’s face staring back at him. He had thought he would have seen his father’s eyes and his own face but there was no sign of Nathaniel Wesninski in the mirror.

“What the fuck?” Neil questioned under his breath and Andrew’s lips moved with the words.

His voice sounded wrong. He hadn’t realized before when he had asked what was going on because he had been distracted by where he was but now he realized that it hadn’t sounded right since he had woken up.

“ _ What the fuck? _ ” Neil hissed out again.

This couldn’t be real. This had to be some twisted nightmare. Or a hallucination. That was it. Riko must have drugged him. That was all this was. Riko had drugged him and for some reason he was hallucinating he was on the worst team in either division. None of this was real.

The face staring back at him looked hauntingly real.

Neil felt a sudden urge to break the mirror, so he punched it, shattering the glass and sending splinters into his— no— Andrew’s knuckles. He stared down at his knuckles in wonder and hoped that they were really bloodied from smashing Riko in the face wherever he was outside of this bizarre hallucination.

Glass rained down across the floor. Neil had to pull splinters of glass from Andrew’s knuckles, but the damage could have been much worse. Still, the blood and the pain seemed real enough, although none of this made sense.

“What the hell, Andrew?” Aaron asked when Neil opened the bathroom door again. “Why would you break the mirror? Look at your hand.”

“It’s nothing,” Neil said, and it wasn’t compared to the pain he had to endure living in the Nest.

“Take your fucking pills,” Aaron said before he pushed his way into the bathroom, stepping awkwardly inside to avoid the glass spread across the floor.

Neil suddenly realized why he was shaky and sweaty and felt like throwing up. It wasn’t just the shock and nerves that came with waking up in the wrong body. Andrew Minyard had been court ordered to take some kind of medication and his ability to play depended on him following that ruling. Apparently, Andrew’s body was going through withdrawal and Neil was along for the ride.

The pills must not be in the bathroom or Aaron wouldn’t have shut the door in his face after telling him to take them, so Neil wandered around the dorm until he found the kitchen. He checked the counters, but found nothing.

“What are you looking for?” Nicky asked as Neil started opening drawers in a futile attempt to figure out where Andrew kept his medication.

“My pills,” Neil said.

“Aren’t they in your desk?” Nicky asked.

“I don’t know,” Neil said, and he left before Nicky could call him on how strange it was for Andrew to not know where he kept his own medication.

Neil tried two desks before he found a pill bottle in the one closest to the window. He read the label and popped two pills in his mouth.

* * *

Andrew Minyard woke up with a start and lashed out at whatever had just touched him. He felt a small sense of satisfaction as he made contact with something and heard a grunt.

“Nathaniel, what the fuck?” Someone with a distinctly French accent asked.

“Who the fuck is Nathaniel?” Andrew questioned as he sat up.

He didn’t know where he was or how he had gotten here and that made his skin crawl, especially when there was someone else in the room.

“I thought we were past you denying your name,” the man said. A light flickered on and suddenly Andrew could see his surroundings. “Get up. Riko is not going to be happy if you make us late for practice.”

The walls around Andrew were painted black and his was one of two beds in a small room. Standing by the door was Jean Moreau, a Raven player.

Andrew had seen walls like this before when Kevin Day and Riko Moriyama had tried to recruit him to the Ravens, but it made no sense for him to be there and there were no Ravens named Nathaniel. Andrew was almost certain he was hallucinating and he could really use Bee, but he didn’t know how he was supposed to find her when he was seeing Castle Evermore.

* * *

Waking up in someone else's body, in someone else's dorm room was disorienting to say the least. But Neil was adaptable. He'd had to learn to be when he had been on the run with his mother, back before his father had caught him and sold him to the Ravens. He was skilled at blending in, so he was just going to have to blend in here as Andrew until he could get away from the other two for long enough to figure out what the hell was going on.

Maybe, if he did a good enough job of pretending to be Andrew, Nicky would forget that he hadn’t known where Andrew kept his pills.

Neil's knowledge of Andrew was limited, but he changed into the plainest black clothes in the dresser next to Andrew's bed, got something to eat, and waited until the other two were ready to go.

"I can't believe  _ you  _ are already ready," Aaron commented and Neil wondered if he had already blown it and Aaron had already figured out that Neil was some imposter in his brother's body.

"Don't fight over a good thing," Nicky insisted. "It's too early in the morning."

Neil said nothing and waited until they walked out of the door first so that he could just follow them instead of giving away that he had no idea what the layout of this building was.

When they got down the three flights of stairs and out to the parking lot, Neil trailed behind them to the car. Luckily, Nicky got into the driver's seat and Aaron got in the back like this was all a part of their regular routine so Neil didn't have to think too hard before climbing into the passenger seat. If either of them noticed anything strange about his silence on the ride to the gym, neither of them said anything about it.

* * *

The gym was bearable at least. It was a different routine than he was used to on the Ravens, but not so foreign that he wasn't able to figure it out as he went through the stations. Neil started out the stations at the usual weight he would push himself to lift, but he was surprised that he had zero struggle so he ended up adding more weight. Working out in this body was great, right up until it was his turn on the treadmill.

Neil loved running. It cleared his head. He had been looking forward to this station since he got to the gym, but there was something very wrong with this body.

He set the machine to his usual speed and started to run, but he couldn't keep up. So he turned the machine down. And down. And down. And down once more. He wasn't thrilled about the lesser speed of this new body, although it shouldn't have been a surprise when speed was what Neil was known for in his own body. The worst part of this body was that he was winded within under a minute on this treadmill. It was like his lungs couldn't find enough air in the room. He felt like any moment he was going to burst into a coughing fit. Running was Neil's favourite activity usually, but in this body it was torture.

* * *

Raven practice was a nightmare.

It lasted hours without a break. At first, Andrew thought that the endurance of Neil’s lungs was incredible. He would have been doubled over choking five minutes into running, but Neil ran fast without breaking a sweat or breathing heavily at first. Clearly, he did not smoke. His body was far better equipped for a long run than Andrew’s was, but even Neil’s body began to suffer after half an hour of straight practice.

It did not help that Neil was a backliner and Andrew had never been allowed anywhere but goal.

He did not know how to play that position and the Ravens were an elite team, undefeated for years.

Neil was a new recruit and it was still close to the beginning of his first season, but no one took it easy on Andrew because of that at all. The rest of the team knocked him over and slammed him into boards and snapped at him for his poor performance. It became abundantly clear within a few minutes of the beginning of the practice that Neil was a weak backliner and the Ravens did not hesitate to exploit that weakness.

Kevin Day, who had tried to recruit Andrew a year and a half ago and who had not played a single game for almost a year since he had broken his left hand in a freak skiing accident, was playing just fine with his right hand. He kept up with the team far better than Andrew and yet he had sat the first game of the new season just like he’d sat the entire second half of the last season.

Andrew didn’t get a break until practice finally ended and he sat on the floor trying to catch his breath.

When the rest of the team started filing out, Andrew moved to get up, but Jean walked over and scowled down at him like Andrew was dogshit Jean had found on the bottom of his shoe. Andrew glared right back at him. He couldn’t care less if Jean Moreau was unimpressed with his lacklustre exy performance.

“We are in charge of cleaning up,” Jean accused. “Thanks to whatever the hell you were doing all practice.”

“You weren’t that great either,” Andrew said. He wasn’t sure if it was true or not, but he figured it probably was if Andrew’s poor performance had put him on the cleanup crew and Jean had gotten stuck cleaning up with him.

“Because I was trying to cover your position on top of mine,” Jean pointed out.

“Why would you do that?” Andrew questioned.

“Because we are partners,” Jean said. “Do not mistake my assistance for sentiment. You suck and we both suffer. That is all. Now get up. I am not cleaning this all up on my own.”

Andrew got up and reluctantly began gathering racquets the rest of the team had dropped on the ground at the end of the practice.

At Fox practices, everyone put away their own racquets. Well, everyone else put their racquets away. Andrew dropped his on the ground and let Aaron or Nicky clean up after him.

As Andrew bent down to grab a racquet marked 2 off of the floor, he kept an eye on Jean and pointed out, “Kevin doesn’t look like he needs to sit out games.”

“He doesn’t,” Jean said.

Andrew waited to see if he would elaborate, but Jean went back to gathering balls with a scowl that said he did not wish to speak any longer so Andrew didn’t push and just mulled the information over with Neil’s pleasantly clear mind.

* * *

Andrew hated having his wrists exposed, even if they were really Neil’s wrists and they were unscarred. He had already felt naked enough in this body without armbands or knives, but when he and Jean made it to the showers, Andrew saw that it was just one open room with showers in the wall and he hated it.

At least the rest of the team was gone, with the one exception. The idea of showering in front of Jean made his stomach churn, whether it was his body or not.

Jean did not seem to have the same hesitation. He just stripped and headed for the nearest shower.

Andrew hesitated and then went to the shower furthest down the wall from him and stripped off Josten’s uniform. He showered as fast as he could and barely had time to notice Josten’s extensive scars in too much detail. He got soap in his eye and it burned, but it was better than shutting his eyes in the showers alone with Jean.

He wasn’t certain there wasn’t still some shampoo left in Neil’s hair, but Andrew was out of the shower and dressed before Jean. He stared at the wall as he waited for Jean to shut the water off and get dressed.

He tried to spend the time taking inventory of the scars he had seen on Neil’s torso to try to figure out possible causes, but his memory failed him in a way that it never had in his own body. He remembered that the skin was gnarled. He remembered circular bumps and raised scarring but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t picture the torso as a whole without blanks his imagination had to fill in. That was interesting. It was almost a novelty to be able to forget so quickly and easily.

* * *

After the gym, Neil was the last one in the changeroom. He was afraid to face the mirror again, but he felt a pull to see if he really was Andrew Minyard.

He barely made it to the mirror before he regretted looking.

Neil raised a hand and watched the reflection. Andrew’s arm moved in synchrony with his. Neil tried to force the smile off of his face, feeling borderline hysterical, but it didn’t budge. He tried to physically pull his mouth into a straight line and watched Andrew try the same, eyes wide with panic and his smile still persisting.

Nothing worked, so Neil gave up and left so that he would not have to face that horrible smile for a moment longer.

When he made it outside, Aaron and Nicky were already waiting for him.

“Took you long enough,” Aaron said.

“Relax,” Nicky said. “We still have plenty of time to get our stuff and get to class.”

Neil realized that he had no idea which classes Andrew took, but he got into the car and tried not to think about it. He knew he couldn’t ask Nicky or Aaron without looking suspicious, so he would just have to figure something out when they got back to Fox Tower.

Nicky drove back to the dorm, then Aaron and Nicky grabbed their stuff and took off for their classes. Neil looked through the desk that must have been his, since Aaron and Nicky had grabbed their things off of the other two. Neil looked through Andrew's belongings, but he couldn't find any information about what classes Andrew was taking.

The only things in his notebooks were elaborate doodles filled with curse words. They weren't exactly helpful. Andrew didn't seem like a student who overly cared about his classes, so Neil figured it wouldn't be a complete red flag if he just skipped classes for the day and anyone found out.

Neil spent the rest of his morning digging through the rest of Andrew's belongings, trying to figure out more about him and frustrated when he didn't have much more of a clue than when he started.

All he found out was that Andrew smoked from the packs of cigarettes in his desk. He could have learned that much about Andrew without the elaborate search anyway since when he gave up and flopped down on one of the beanbag chairs, he noticed that his hands were shaking. His body was craving something, but his mind wasn't in the right place to know what.

He got up and started pacing around the room again, trying to avoid his- no, Andrew's smiling reflection in the mirror. He walked up and down the room until he remembered the pack of cigarettes stowed away in the desk. Neil had never been much of a smoker, but he did like to watch the flame. It reminded him of his mother.

The window screen was broken, seemingly to help Andrew's ability to smoke without having to leave his dorm. Neil sat down on top of Andrew's desk, pulled out the pack of cigarettes and wondered where he would find a lighter. He didn't have to wonder long since he found one inside the carton when he opened up the cigarettes to grab one.

He lit it up and was comforted by the familiar smell of nicotine, but he also found himself craving more in a way that he was not accustomed to. Neil didn't actually smoke his cigarettes. Andrew did and his body was screaming out for Neil to soothe its withdrawal. Neil considered for a moment. He knew Andrew's smoking habit probably had to do with why his body had such a hard time when it came to running.

Neil brought the cigarette up to Andrew's lips and inhaled deeply. He felt a sense of relief wash over him immediately. This was what Andrew's body had been begging for. Neil smoked his way through an entire cigarette. And then another. He hoped this habit wouldn't stick when he got back into his own body. If he ever got back to his own body.

That led to a jolting thought.

If Neil was in Andrew's body and he wasn't just having some weird hallucination or fever dream, then what the hell was going on in Neil's body? Where was Andrew? Had they swapped places? Or was this part of some elaborate body swap chain with someone else in his? Was his own body dead and he'd somehow ended up in Andrew's? Somehow, Neil would prefer that to a stranger in his body and someone else finding out his secrets.

* * *

Andrew didn’t have to try too hard to figure out what classes Neil was in.

After practice, Andrew had gone back to Neil’s room for about thirty seconds before Jean snapped, “Come on, Nathaniel.”

Andrew wasn’t sure where they were going, but he got off of the bed.

“Aren’t you bringing your stuff?”

“What stuff?” Andrew asked.

“Your notebooks,” Jean said. “Or are you planning on flunking your classes?”

Andrew looked around and grabbed a couple notebooks and pens from beside Neil’s bed and then followed Jean.

Apparently, Jean was his partner all day and Andrew just had to follow him.

* * *

Practice was even worse than the gym. They thought Neil was Andrew, so they expected him to practice as a goalie. Neil had never played as a goalkeeper before. He wasn't very good at it.

"What a surprise," Allison deadpanned when Neil missed Seth's thirteenth shot in a row, despite his best efforts to try to predict the trajectory and get himself in the ball's path. "Andrew isn't trying. No wonder our team is in last place."

Neil wasn't trained for this and his reflex felt unbearably sluggish. It was like by the time he had realized that Seth had shot and by the time he told his body to move to block the shot, the wall behind him would have already lit up red. It was endlessly frustrating. Neil didn't understand why he couldn't run like himself, but he couldn't play like Andrew either. He hated it.

At the break in practice, Neil took a seat on the bleachers next to Nicky and downed half a bottle of water.

“I think your girlfriend is waiting for you,” Nicky said and then gestured toward where Renee was standing with his chin.

Neil was horrified. He had no idea what Renee was waiting for and he didn’t particularly want to spend any time with her, especially when she thought he was her boyfriend.

“Andrew,” Renee said. “Are you coming on our walk?”

Everyone was looking at Neil waiting for him to go with her.

Neil weighed his options. He could either go with Renee and only have to pretend to be Andrew in front of her, or he could stay with the team and have to tolerate and fool them all.

Neil stood up.

As he began to walk with her, behind him he heard Matt and Nicky pointing out how neither of them had said anything to contradict the girlfriend comment.

“Do you think animals can become zombies?” Renee asked once they were out of earshot of the others and Neil was startled by the question.

“Zombies aren’t real,” Neil said.

“But if they were,” Renee said, completely unfazed by him turning down her conversation starter. “Would only humans become zombies? Or would animals be able to change into zombies too?”

Her choice of conversation wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but Neil had zero desire to talk about hypothetical zombie situations with Andrew’s girlfriend. There was no way he was going to chime in.

“I think that it spreads like a virus, so animals probably can become zombies too,” Renee said. “Maybe, it’s like rabies. But then what if an animal or a person doesn’t get bitten by a zombie but they eat a zombie fish?”

Neil ignored her, but she didn’t take the hint.

“Are they safe?” She asked. “Or do they become a zombie? Or do they just get sick from eating rotten meat?”

Neil wondered if this was what Andrew and Renee considered romance.

“Okay, so you’re not in the mood to talk about zombies,” she said. “What do you want to talk about then?”

Neil said nothing. He wished he was in his own body and could run around the inner court instead of putting up with Andrew’s girlfriend while walking at a snail’s pace.

“How about aliens?” Renee asked. “If you could only have five things to try to survive an alien invasion, what would you pick?”

Neil didn’t know or care what he would take. He wanted this conversation to be over so much that he was relieved when Wymack called them back to practice.

* * *

Neil was in awe of the Foxes’ locker room. Each of the shower stalls had a private stall and, even though it was not his body, Neil was relieved for the privacy.

In the Nest, everyone knew about Neil’s scars but he still felt his skin crawl every time he had to shower in the wide open facilities. He hated anyone seeing the marks his parents had left.

It wasn’t until he was in the shower with Andrew’s armbands off that he realized that Andrew had scars to hide too. At least that made the idea that Andrew could be in his body seeing his scars a little less awful. Now, Neil had something to hold over his head if Andrew really was in his body and decided to spread Neil’s true identity.

* * *

Andrew had barely made it back to the room that Neil and Jean shared and put the notebooks he had taken zero notes in down next to the bed, when Jean said, “Let’s go. Time to eat before practice.”

Andrew was starving and couldn’t wait to eat. When he made it to the Raven dining hall, all that he was fed was disgusting health food. Everything tasted like spinach. All the Ravens had to eat the same thing.

Andrew scarfed down the meal and hoped that practice would be short. He had thought when the first practice of the day had lasted for hours that maybe he wouldn’t have to endure an afternoon practice, or at least it wouldn’t be as long, but when they made it to the court, the timer on the wall said that they would be stuck there for another two hours, probably without any breaks again.

* * *

Neil avoided Aaron, Nicky, and the rest of the team as best as he could for the evening. His body felt exhausted, although he did not think that he had exerted an overwhelming amount of energy during the day.

Neil didn’t know how long he would stay in Andrew’s body. Maybe, he would be trapped forever. Maybe, he would blink any second and open his eyes in his own body.

If they changed back, Neil was going to be prepared. He tore a page from Andrew’s notebook and wrote a warning for him, then folded it up and shoved it in his armband.

Eventually, he went to bed early. He hoped more than anything to wake up in his own body in the morning which was very uncharacteristic. The idea of being trapped in his own body at Castle Evermore wasn't quite as terrifying as the idea of someone else in his body finding out all his secrets.

Neil had no idea what he was going to do if he was still stuck in Andrew's body in the morning, but he figured that would be a problem for the morning.


	2. Chapter 2

**Tuesday**

“Nathaniel, wake up,” Jean snapped. “You are not making us late two mornings in a row.

The Nest was awful, but at least Neil knew the routine when he was back in his own body.

Everyone there knew he was the Butcher’s son. Secrets were futile.

In the Nest, there was no wondering where to go. His big mouth could get him in trouble, but it would not make anyone new figure out the truth that Nathaniel Wesninski was alive and semi-well, living underground at Castle Evermore.

Every day was the same with the Ravens.

Wake up. Practice. Eat. Go to classes. Eat. Practice. Do homework and hope Riko had someone else to bother. Practice with Kevin. Sleep. Start over again.

Neil Josten had never been so relieved to start a morning as Nathaniel Wesninski in his whole life.

* * *

Andrew was used to the feeling of his armband and Renee's knives against his wrist, but this was something different. There was a strange itch there too, one that he would have blamed on withdrawal if he wasn't already on his meds and didn't have a cigarette between his lips.

He slipped his fingers under his armband to check if he was imagining it and felt his fingers brush against a piece of folded up paper.

"Leave your knives in your armbands," Aaron said.

Andrew ignored him and slid the paper from his armband.

"What's that?" Nicky questioned.

Andrew didn't even glance in his direction as he unfolded the paper to find the note that had been left for him while he had been in Neil's body.

The paper looked like it had been ripped out of a notebook, with shreds of paper where they would have connected to the coils. Written at the top of the paper was one sentence.

_ You tell anyone my secrets and I spill yours. _

It was a threat, but it was also an offer. Andrew didn't know how much Neil knew about him and he didn't want to know how much he would potentially find out, but Andrew was glad that Neil was planning to keep whatever he found out to himself. Andrew could handle keeping Neil's secrets in exchange. It wasn't like anyone else would believe him anyway.

* * *

By the end of morning practice, when he and Jean were stuck cleaning up the court, Neil wished that he was back with the Foxes.

He didn’t want to be in Andrew’s body ever again. He never wanted to feel the fogginess of Andrew’s drugged mind again, but he had gotten a taste of what it was like to be a Palmetto State Fox and, even though their team was in dead last, Neil wished that he was a part of that team instead.

Not for the people, although they couldn’t be worse than Riko and Tetsuji, but for the environment. Foxes were allowed to take breaks in their practices. Foxes got to choose their own meals. Foxes got privacy in the showers.

Neil had convinced himself that he was growing used to the horrible conditions in the Nest, but one day in Andrew Minyard’s body had been enough to make Neil yearn for the outside world and a team that wouldn’t torture him.

* * *

Andrew hated the library, but he had research to do and they didn’t have a computer in the dorm. He needed to know who Nathaniel Wesninski was. He needed to know if that was just a name that he had made up and all of the day before really had just been a hallucination or if something more was going on.

Most of the search results were about a Nathan Wesninski, far too old to be Neil Josten and in prison anyway. His eyes looked similar to how Neil’s had without the brown contacts he apparently wore.

Andrew looked through links until he found one that mentioned a missing son and daughter, Nathaniel and Mary Wesninski. Andrew enlarged the image and zoomed in on Nathaniel’s old school picture. The hair was a different colour and he was a lot younger. His eyes were bright blue. But the boy in the picture sure as hell looked like Neil Josten.

Either Andrew really had completely lost touch with any sense of reality or there was one hell of a conspiracy going on at Castle Evermore.

Next, he searched Neil Josten. There wasn’t a whole bunch on him at all. Andrew couldn’t find anything from before he had been playing in Millport and gotten recruited to the Ravens. However, here was a video of an interview on some talk show when he had been introduced as a new Raven and the newest recruit to Riko’s perfect court.

Andrew figured it was going to be utterly boring, but he clicked the link anyway. He ignored the glares of others in the library as the Kathy Ferdinand show began blasting through the speakers. He didn’t give a fuck if he was bothering them.

The start of the interview was mind-numbingly boring. Riko went on about how great the Ravens were. Kevin parroted his answers. Neil just sat there. It went on and on.

There was some talk of Kevin’s ski incident halfway through last season and how he still hadn’t played in a game since but he was still a part of the Ravens’ team. Riko handled most of the talk about how Kevin was an honorary Raven and Kevin said nothing.

Andrew was about to click out of the video when Neil erupted.

The next three and a half minutes were him accusing Riko and the rest of the Ravens of hiding Kevin’s abilities because they feared what he could still do with his right hand and accusing Riko of being a piss poor friend to Kevin with a fragile as glass ego.

Andrew still didn’t give a fuck about exy or their argument, but Neil Josten/Nathaniel Wesninski and his big mouth had caught his interest.

* * *

**Wednesday**

Neil was stuck in Andrew’s body again when he woke up the next morning.

After the gym, he hoped that he would find some hint of a clue on Andrew’s desk so that he could go to Andrew’s classes.

He thought that maybe Andrew would have some sort of notes that could give him at least a hint about what kind of classes Andrew was taking. Instead, he found a note for him.

_ Why do you wear colored contacts and hide that you are supposed to be dead? _

Neil grabbed a pen and scratched out Andrew’s question until there wasn’t even a fraction of a letter visible and then he wrote his own message underneath.

* * *

Worse than afternoon Fox practice was when Nicky made Neil leave early. Apparently, Wednesday meant Andrew had to go sit in a room with Dr. Betsy Dobson for an hour.

At least Neil wouldn’t have to talk to her. He could just ignore her like he was sure Andrew would.

That plan didn’t work so well. Six and a half minutes of drawn out silence after Neil had accepted but not drank cocoa from her, Dr. Dobson asked, “What’s wrong?”

Neil just blinked back at her.

“You’re not drinking your hot chocolate. You’re not talking. Obviously, something is wrong.”

“No offence, Dr. Dobson,” he said and she frowned as if it was strange for Andrew to refer to her by name. “But there is nothing I want to talk about with you.”

“Nothing?” she asked. “Are you sure? Then why don’t you tell me about your day so far? What did you do?”

“Well, I woke up in a drugged up Fox goalkeeper again instead of my own body,” Neil said. “I have no idea what classes Andrew is taking, Nicky made me leave practice early, and now I’m stuck here talking to you.”

“So, you’re not Andrew?” she asked. “Then who are you?”

She didn’t brush it off immediately as him being a sarcastic asshole she wasn’t going to get through to. He was sure she was just phishing for more information to use against him or Andrew or them both though.

There was no way Neil was going to give her any information about who he really was, so he lied, “That was a joke. You were disappointed I didn’t have anything to talk about so I played the crazy part.”

She stared at him for a long moment as if she was trying to tell if he really was crazy and just trying to cover it up.

Neil couldn’t stand her scrutiny any longer, so he struggled to grasp any topic he could to change the subject.

“Our season sucks so far,” Neil said. “I don’t know why I’m here instead of practice when clearly our team needs a lot of work, especially with the shortage of subs. Did you know the Ravens have three times as many players as we do?”

* * *

Andrew was confused when Kevin showed up in Neil’s room late at night, but Jean seemed unsurprised. In fact, he was looking at Andrew like he had lost Neil’s last remaining brain cell.

“What?” Andrew asked.

“Hurry up,” Kevin said in an exasperated tone as if Andrew should have somehow read his mind and should already know that he was supposed to be going somewhere.

“Pass,” Andrew said because he had no desire to go walk into whatever trap Kevin could potentially be about to lead him into at Riko’s request and because if one thing had become abundantly clear to Andrew in his time in Neil’s body, it was that he did not need to worry about revealing he wasn’t Neil by making the smartass retort.

“Funny,” Kevin deadpanned. “Let’s go. You’re wasting time. I only have so much time before Riko comes back from Tetsuji’s office.”

That was interesting. Kevin was supposed to be Riko’s unconditional sidekick and from what Andrew had seen, he took Riko’s shit and waited on him hand and foot without so much as a word of disagreement. If he was sneaking around behind Riko’s back on the regular, Andrew wanted to know why.

Andrew didn’t bother asking where they were going. It was clear he was already supposed to know. Obviously, it would be out of character for Neil to refuse, so Andrew stood up and figured he would figure out what the fuck was going on when he got wherever they were going.

At least he would have the opportunity to talk to Kevin without Riko around.

* * *

Kevin’s choice of rebellion turned out to be disappointingly dull, but it was rebellion nonetheless.

They went back to the court, as if Kevin hadn’t gotten his fill of practice during the hours they had spent there during the day. Kevin made Andrew change into Neil’s equipment and he changed into his own.

To Andrew’s horror, Kevin made him run striker drills.

“You’re too slow,” Kevin snapped, although Andrew was a hell of a lot faster in Neil’s body than he could ever hope to be in his own, even if he wasn’t familiar with these drills.

Andrew wanted to sit down and refuse to do Kevin’s drills. He was not afraid of Kevin Day and if he was in his own body, he would tell him to fuck off. But Andrew was in a body that usually gave into Kevin’s shit and he needed to play along if he wanted any more of a glimpse at rebellious Kevin instead of going back to Neil’s room and staring at the ceiling three feet from Jean while he did the same.

So Andrew ignored Kevin and kept going.

They’d been at it for twenty minutes when Andrew asked, “How long are we going to keep at this?”

Kevin mistook his question for meaning in the grand scheme of things and not this nightmare of a secret extra practice as he responded, “Until it’s muscle memory. But that’ll have to be enough for tonight since you wasted so much time dawdling.”

Andrew wished that Neil already had the drills as muscle memory. Maybe then, he would be able to breeze through them instead of fumbling over his own feet while Kevin yelled at him for it.

“Next time, I’ll take even longer,” Andrew said. “Maybe we can skip drills altogether.”

“No one likes drills,” Kevin said. “But you said you wanted me to train you to be a striker. You’re never going to one worth a damn if you’re still tripping your way through these.”

Neil wanted striker training? Why would he want that? He was a backliner. He had been a striker at Millport, but for some reason had been recruited to the Ravens as a backliner. Why would he need Kevin to secretly train him how to play a position he no longer played?

“You need to practice shooting,” Kevin said.

“On you?” Andrew asked. “You are hardly a goalie.”

“Goalies are unimportant,” Kevin insisted. Andrew wished that his own team would agree and get off of his back. “If you can shoot on an empty goal, you can shoot on one with a goalkeeper in front of it.”

Kevin’s logic sounded deeply flawed to Andrew, but he didn’t care enough to argue so he shot in the general direction of the goal with Neil’s awkwardly weighted racquet.

Andrew could feel Kevin’s scowl of disapproval without looking at him when it hit the wall six inches to the left of the goal. Andrew didn’t care.

He didn’t bother aiming. He just whipped balls at the wall as hard as he could. Some of them went in. Others didn’t. He didn’t watch to track where they went. He just grabbed the next ball out of the bucket, thinking that as far as ways to let off steam went, this wasn’t as satisfying as sparring with Renee. Hopefully, when the bucket was empty, Kevin would give up on practice.

* * *

Andrew sat on the floor of the court at the end of their practice and watched without offering any assistance as Kevin scooped balls up off of the court floor and shot them into the bucket from wherever he found them.

“What really happened to your hand?” Andrew asked.

Kevin’s back was to him and he visibly tensed and hesitated for a moment before he grabbed the ball with his racquet and said, “You know already.”

Andrew really didn’t, but he could tell that he was onto something by the way Kevin reacted, so he ordered, “Say it.”

“Riko broke it,” Kevin said. “I threw a match to him and he still broke my hand for being better than him.”

That helped explain why Kevin was so good for someone who wasn’t allowed to play in actual games. He had been like a mascot before he was old enough play on the team. Now, he had returned to the role and was a publicity stunt rather than a player. He was poor Kevin Day, broken son of exy and honourary Raven, while Riko was the unquestioned best.

“Do you want out of here?” Andrew asked when Kevin was facing him again and he could judge his reaction. “Do you want to play on a team that doesn’t keep you on the bench?”

“You know I do,” Kevin said, then he shot another ball in.

It bounced off the rim of the bucket before it landed inside with the other balls. Kevin frowned as if he was personally offended that it had not just landed directly in the bin in the first place.

“I have a plan to get us out. At the fall banquet,” Andrew said. “Just you and me. But you have to trust me. Follow me and don’t breathe a word of this to anyone and I promise you I will get you out of the Nest, away from Riko, and onto a team that will let you play.”

“You can’t possibly guarantee that,” Kevin pointed out, but Andrew could tell he had caught his interest because Kevin had yet to retrieve another ball.

“You let me worry about the details and about this working,” Andrew said. “All you have to do is promise.”

Kevin hesitated for a long moment, and, for a second, Andrew thought that he had made the wrong choice with Kevin. He had thought that Kevin had just needed a little push to help him choose freedom but maybe Kevin had spent too many years under the Moriyamas’ thumbs and had been brainwashed after all.

“I promise,” Kevin said. His words came out shaky but there was a conviction in his eyes that said he wanted this, even if it utterly terrified him. “I won’t tell anyone about your plan.”

“And?”

“And I’ll follow your lead,” Kevin said.

Andrew felt a smile pull at Neil’s lips. It wasn’t the smile Andrew’s medication forced onto his lips, but it was something just as dangerous.

“That’s the smartest thing you’ve said since I met you.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Thursday**

The next morning, Andrew woke up in his own body and headed straight for his desk to see if Neil had responded to his note.

When he opened the notebook, he found Neil had scratched out his message and left a question of his own.

_ What are your classes? _

Andrew didn’t particularly think he should have to answer Neil’s question after Neil had so blatantly disregarded his own. But if Neil was going to keep invading Andrew’s body, then it couldn’t hurt for him to know Andrew’s schedule.

He jotted it down and then tried texting Neil’s number from memory. Even in his own body, he struggled to remember the number he had repeated to himself over and over as Neil to the to remember. Neil’s faulty memory was starting to get irritating. Andrew could remember Pig Higgins’ cell phone number from a decade ago easier with more certainty than Neil’s number as he typed it in.

_ You didn’t answer my question. _

Andrew waited several minutes, but no answer came. Maybe, Neil was at practice. Maybe, Andrew had gotten the number wrong. Or, maybe, Neil was ignoring him.

_ I have a plan to help you, but you need to answer me. _

Still, no answer came.

* * *

Andrew knocked on the door to Renee’s dorm and ignored the frown that Dan got when she saw him.

“Where is Renee?” He asked.

“That depends,” Dan said. “Are you going to beat her up?”

“Renee can look after herself,” Andrew pointed out. “And sparring is not beating her up.”

Andrew actually had no intention of sparring with Renee that night, but he did not owe Dan and her judgment any sort of explanation.

“Oh, Andrew,” Renee said as she appeared behind Dan, coming to check who was at the door. “I’m not busy. Are we going somewhere?”

Andrew nodded his head and ignored Dan’s warning look.

* * *

**Friday**

Neil finally knew Andrew’s schedule and had gotten used to Andrew’s routine, or so he thought, but when he went to take Andrew’s awful medication on Friday, Nicky grabbed the bottle out of his hand.

“What are you doing?” Nicky questioned before Neil could ask him the same thing. When Neil just blinked back at him, Nicky added, “It’s Friday. We have a game tonight.”

“And?” Neil asked.

Nicky’s brow furrowed. “You don’t take them before games. Remember?”

“Oh,” Neil said.

Nicky studied him far too close for Neil’s comfort and he had to resist the urge to look away.   
“Are you feeling alright, Andrew?”

“I’m fine,” Neil lied.

* * *

When they left the dorm, the upperclassmen were down the hallway.

Neil made the mistake of stepping into the hallway in front of Aaron and Nicky and Renee locked eyes with him from across the hall and stepped away from her friend group.

Neil instinctively turned to avoid conversation with her. He had zero desire to spend more time around Andrew’s girlfriend and he was terrified of the idea of being pulled somewhere alone with her. More terrifying than the idea of her making a move on him thinking he was Andrew was the idea that she would be able to tell that he was not Andrew.

Neil wandered through the dorm, killing time to try to make sure that Renee and the others would be gone before he went back into the hallway. He hoped that they had somewhere they needed to be and that the other four would not be willing to wait for Renee to wait around for Andrew.

When he finally risked going back into the hallway, the upperclassmen had disappeared. Neil knew that he wouldn’t be able to avoid Renee forever, but at least he had managed for the moment.

“What the hell were you doing?” Aaron asked.

“I forgot my phone,” Neil lied, although Andrew’s memory was far better than his own and Neil found it easier to remember the events of days he spent as Andrew when he was in Andrew’s body than it was to remember days spent as himself when he was in his own body. “I had to look for it.”

* * *

Andrew hated games in his own body, but the idea of playing in Neil’s body was even worse. At least, he got to start off the game on the bench since the Ravens had no shortage of backliners. But, sooner or later, Neil was going to have to step foot on the court which meant unless Neil magically took over his body again, Andrew was going to be stuck playing as a backliner.

Maybe, if Andrew was lucky, Tetsuji would make Neil a benchwarmer with Kevin. Andrew didn’t really understand why they still played Neil when they complained about his performance constantly.

“Do not screw this game up,” Jean hissed as they sat down on the bench for the start of the game. “I am sick of being punished for your incompetence.”

* * *

Neil couldn’t believe that he had to play a game in Andrew’s body. Even worse was the thought that Andrew would be playing the Raven game as him.

At least, Neil’s head was clear for once in Andrew’s body. He might actually be able to tell the ball was coming at him before it was already past him. Maybe. Hopefully.

Renee was playing goalie for the first half which meant Neil got to just sit on the bench and relax. Or, so he thought. He’d barely gotten one step into the inner court before Nicky grabbed him by the shoulder.

Neil slid Andrew’s shoulder out from Nicky’s grip and turned to him annoyed. “What?”   
“Are you trying to get caught off your drugs?” Nicky questioned. “What’s going on with you today?”

No wonder Neil hadn’t known that Andrew went off of his drugs for games. Andrew pretended he was still on them so that he could play with a clear mind without anyone figuring it out.

“Nothing is going on,” Neil lied.

“Then smile,” Nicky said. “I’m not watching you go to jail because you couldn’t plaster on a fake smile.”

Neil forced Andrew’s lips into a horrifying smile. He had thought that the involuntary smiling in Andrew’s body was awful, but having to intentionally force the same smile to stay there without letting it slip wasn’t much better.

“There you go,” Nicky said. “Much better.”

* * *

Neil and Jean were sent onto the court halfway through the first half.

Andrew ran to Neil’s position and against every instinct in him, he tried. He did not care about exy or the  Ravens or Neil’s reputation, but he knew that if he played awfully that Riko would take it out on him. That would have been fine if it was just him, but this was Neil’s body.

Whatever Riko did to him would not heal before Neil was thrown back into his body with injuries Riko had given Andrew.

So when a Trojan striker had the ball, Andrew charged at him as fast as Neil’s legs could carry him, but the striker sidestepped him easily and scored.

Andrew didn’t need to understand Jean’s French to know that he was yelling at him for screwing up.

Clearly, charging at the striker had not worked, so the next time that Andrew’s mark got the ball, Andrew just stood between him and the goal. The striker bounced the ball off the wall and ran around him to catch the pass he had thrown to himself. This time, the Raven’s goalkeeper stopped the ball, but Andrew knew that would not get Neil out of trouble.

* * *

The second half came all too soon and Neil found himself standing in front of the Foxes’ goal.   
He knew from the way the rest of the team talked about Andrew at practices that expectations were not overly high. Andrew was a brilliant goalkeeper when he wanted to be, but most of the time he couldn’t be bothered to put in the effort.

Neil was not a brilliant goaltender by any means, but he intended to try his damnedest anyway. Maybe, if he was lucky it would make up for the skill deficit.

At the beginning of the second half, the score was tied and there was a chance that the Foxes could actually win a game.

The Fox team was exceptionally small though. Dan and Seth had played the full first half as strikers and now they were too exhausted to find any scoring opportunities playing as strikers again in the second half. Renee had been in goal for the entire first half and she was no dealer when she hadn’t already played the whole first half in a different position. Matt was the strongest backliner they had, but he’d played the entire first half and was on the bench now.

The team was tired and there was no way that they could carry Neil’s deadweight. Within seven minutes of the half beginning, the Foxes were down by three points.

By the end of the game, Neil could barely stand. He was shaking and sweaty and felt like he could bend over and vomit on the court floor at any moment. He was too busy trying to stand up and wondering why the hell Andrew put himself through this horrifying withdrawal every weak if he didn’t care enough to try anyway to even try to stop shots.

When the buzzer sounded, they were down an astounding fifteen points and Neil was impressed that he’d managed to keep the point gap that small and had actually stopped some of the other team’s shots.

As soon as the game was over, Nicky rushed over and propped him up with an arm around his shoulders as if he was just trying to make his cousin feel better after a poor performance.

“We just have to make it through the handshake,” Nicky said in German.

Neil responded in German, “I’m going to be sick.”

Nicky pushed their way to the front of the line and Neil forced his way through the line up.

He didn’t wait for the rest of the team and Nicky must have understood his urgency, because he walked with him.

Neil didn’t make it to the change rooms before he emptied the contents of Andrew’s stomach onto the floor, but at least they were away from the crowd and cameras.

When Neil managed to right himself and lean against the wall, Aaron was there with concern in his eyes.

“I’m fine,” Neil insisted, although he was not at all convinced that was true.

He pushed off the wall to prove that he could walk by himself, but a part of him was relieved when Nicky grabbed onto his arm.

“I’ll get him to the locker room,” Nicky said. “You get his meds.”

* * *

Tetsuji made Neil sit the entire second half, even when Jean was put back on the court. The Ravens still had a major lead. Being benched suited Andrew just fine though, but Kevin eyed him with concern.

When Riko was on the court and Tetsuji was at the other end of the bench, reprimanding a dealer, Kevin said in a hushed voice, “Tonight isn’t going to be pretty. Riko is pissed off about your attitude enough and after this performance, Tetsuji isn’t going to give him many limits.”

Andrew glanced at Kevin, who immediately faced the court again to try to make it look like they had not been talking. Andrew wondered why Kevin was risking talking to him like this and what help Kevin thought pointing that out would be.

When Kevin spoke again, his eyes were still focused on the game and his voice was barely above a whisper. “We can take tonight off of night practice. You’ll need whatever healing time you can get.”

* * *

**Saturday**

Neil woke up sore from some torture Riko had inflicted on him the night before. He tried to stand up, but his body screamed in protest and he had to stop ad sit back down on his bed.

Neil couldn’t make himself care that Andrew had endured torture because he was trapped in his body. He knew that he should have felt guilty, but all he felt was glad that he had been outside of his body for the experience.

He couldn’t afford to worry about anyone else’s well-being. Neil was too busy trying to keep himself alive.

“Get up,” Jean said. “We have practice.”

Neil wondered if the Foxes had to practice twice a day on Saturdays too.

When Neil didn’t move right away, Jean frowned.

“I know that you are in pain, but trust me, it will be worse for us both if you do not get up and go to practice,” Jean said.

Neil couldn’t tell if it was sympathy in Jean’s tone or just a desire not to end up worse off himself because of Neil’s injuries.

* * *

Saturday night, Andrew was relieved to get away from campus and have a break from exy for the weekend, especially in his own body.

He didn’t take his meds and risked withdrawal so that he could drink and so that he could distract himself with Roland. Yet, when he got to Eden’s Twilight and Roland asked if Andrew would be back when he took his break, Andrew hesitated.

Maybe, it was because his body hadn’t stayed his this week, but suddenly he did not feel comfortable with the distraction.

“I’ll just take the drinks for tonight,” Andrew said.

Roland looked a little surprised, but said, “All right. Let me know if you change your mind.”

Andrew already knew that he wouldn’t.


	4. Chapter 4

**Sunday**

When he finally got back to Fox Tower after waking up in Columbia with Aaron and Nicky, Neil was almost back to the relative safety of Andrew’s dorm room with Aaron and Nicky in tow, when a voice called from behind him.

“Andrew.”

Neil tried to ignore her, but Renee persisted.

“ _ Andrew. _ ”

Aaron and Nicky were staring at Neil now, as if he was acting strange, so Neil reluctantly turned around.

“I’d like to talk to you a moment,” Renee said in that sweet innocent voice that she always put on.

Aaron and Nicky were still standing there, waiting for Andrew’s reaction.

Neil didn’t have a choice. He took a step toward her and told the other two, I’ll be back later.”

Neil regretted his decision the moment that he was alone in the hallway with Renee. It would be difficult and unpleasant enough to spend time with her as Andrew and convince her that he truly was her boyfriend.

It was so much worse when she blinked at him for a moment and said, “Oh, you must be Neil.”

Even past the fog in Andrew’s mind, Neil was aware enough to feel a dull panic.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said.

“It’s okay,” Renee said. “We can talk somewhere more private if you’d like, but Andrew told me that you two have been switching places on and off lately.”

Neil didn’t feel relief that he did not have to play the part with her. He didn’t feel the impending doom that he probably would have if he was in his own body at the moment and not trapped in Andrew’s drugged mind. Instead, he felt a dim awareness that this would probably go horribly wrong but couldn’t muster up the brain power to think any action through too many steps.

“Where are we going that’s private?” Neil asked.

“Let’s go for a drive,” Renee said. “Grab your keys. Or I can borrow Allison’s.”

“Andrew lets you drive his car?” Neil asked. From what Neil could tell, Andrew wasn’t even allowed to drive his own car.

“He can’t drive on his medication,” Renee said. “Usually he gets Nicky to. Sometimes I do.”

Neil just blinked at her.

“If I’m lying, you can blame me for tricking you,” she said.

* * *

A few minutes later, they were in Andrew’s car and Renee was turning the key Neil had gotten for her.

“I don’t know what your boyfriend told you-” Neil started before he got cut off.

“Andrew is not my boyfriend,” Renee said.

“If he’s not, then why do you two let everyone assume he is?” Neil challenged.

“I get a cut of Allison’s winnings in bets,” Renee said. “And Andrew gets peace of mind.”

“What does that mean?” Neil questioned.

“Andrew is gay,” she told him.

“Why are you telling me that?” Neil asked.

“Because he said to,” she said. “I don’t know a lot about you because Andrew said that those secrets aren’t his to tell, but I do know that Andrew has a plan to get you and Kevin both out of the Nest and that he needs your trust and you to be a part of it if it’s going to work. He sent me with free information and to make sure that you listen to his plan. He says you’ve been ignoring his messages.”

“If I ignore him, then why the hell wouldn’t I ignore you?” he demanded.

“Listen first,” Renee said. “Then if you want to ignore everything I tell you, go for it. I can’t make you agree to the plan if you don’t want to, but if any part of you wants to leave Evermore, you will hear us out.”

“I can’t get out while you’re driving, can I?” Neil asked, but he knew that if he really wanted to escape this conversation he would tuck and roll out the door. Still, it was nice to have an excuse for being trapped in this conversation.

It couldn’t hurt just to hear the plan out.

* * *

When Andrew finally got back to Neil’s dorm after hours of painful practicing on a Sunday because apparently Ravens never got a break, he checked Neil’s phone right away.

He didn’t have any texts from his own phone, but he did have one from Renee’s number.

_ I talked to Neil. He does not trust me, but he listened to the plan. _

At least Andrew knew that Neil was aware of the plan now, but he resented Neil’s stubbornness and the fact that his ability to keep his promise to Kevin relied on Neil’s cooperation.

* * *

Neil had barely made it back to the dorm when Andrew’s phone buzzed in his pocket.

He had zero desire to check the message, but pulled the phone out anyway.

“Who the hell is texting you if you were just with Renee?” Aaron accused.

“Santa,” Neil deadpanned as he stared down at the screen. “He says you’re on his shit list.”

For a moment, Neil didn’t even read Andrew’s text. He was too busy staring at the name of the contact.

_ Neil Josten _ .

Andrew knew that Neil’s real name was Nathaniel Wesninski and yet he had entered Neil into his phone as Neil Josten and somehow that meant something. Neil still did not know that he could trust Andrew and his plan, but this felt important.

He stared down at the phone for a long moment before he finally opened the text to see what Andrew wanted.

_ Renee says she talked to you. _

“You are such an asshole,” Aaron muttered and then he got up and stormed out of the room.

“You know, you could try to get along with him,” Nicky pointed out. “Or at least not actively try to piss him off.”

“What would be the point of that?” Neil asked without glancing away from the phone.

“You two are brothers,” Nicky said. He suddenly sounded overwhelmingly exhausted as he added, “Or, at least, you’re supposed to be.”

Neil glanced up at Nicky now. This sounded like a conversation he’d had many times before with the same results each time. Neil knew that Aaron was annoying and he knew that the twins objectively had not known about each other that long, but he hadn’t realized that there was something deeper going on than brotherly bickering. Neil had never had a brother to compare this to.

He didn’t know what to say to Nicky, so he said nothing and typed out a response to Andrew instead.

_ Delete messages after you send and read them. I don’t need to get killed because Riko or Tetsuji checked my phone and found out about your plan. _

Andrew’s reply came a moment later.

_ Remember this feeling. This is the moment you stopped being a dumbass. _

Neil glared down at the screen.  _ Remind me why I should trust you. _

Andrew’s answer wasn’t exactly satisfactory, but at least it was honest.

_ You shouldn’t. But I haven’t spilled your secrets yet and you don’t have that many options. _

_ That’s reassuring. _

_ I am not here to hold your hand and tell you everything is going to be okay. It’s not. But I promised Kevin I would get him out and that means saving you too. What is the opposite of collateral damage? _

Neil didn’t bother dignifying that with a response.

He hoped Andrew would take the hint and leave him alone, but the next text came only moments later.

_ You still have to tell me why you play under a fake name and everyone thinks you’re dead. _

Neil stared down at the screen for several minutes, then finally he typed back an answer.

_ Get us out of the Nest first. Then you can ask questions. _

* * *

**Monday**

Monday, Neil was glad that he was in his own body for night practice with Kevin. He’d been falling behind in their training because of all of the body swapping.

Training with Kevin was frustrating. Kevin pushed Neil beyond his limits, but at least he was learning a position he enjoyed from a master instead of fumbling his way through practices in Andrew’s body.

They had only been practicing for about half an hour when Kevin stopped and just stared at Neil.

“The banquet is only six days away,” Kevin said finally. “That’s not a lot of time to get organized. We don’t even have anything to blackmail them with yet. What makes you think this plan is going to work?”

“We can’t just break into Tetsuji’s office any time,” Neil pointed out. He refused to call Tetsuji ‘The Master’ when he was not there and Kevin flinched at the open rebellion. “We have to wait for a window of opportunity. We need to be smart so we don’t get caught.”

Kevin already seemed to doubtful of the plan which meant that Neil had to act as if he was positive that this would work.

“What if there isn’t a window of opportunity?” Kevin asked. “What if our chances of getting evidence slips away more and more every day?”

“Are you saying you want to storm into his office now and gather what we can?” Neil questioned.

“No,” Kevin said. “I’m saying don’t lie to me and say this is a sure thing when it’s not.”

* * *

Andrew spent Monday night sparring with Renee. It was a relief to let some of his pent up anger out in a setting that did not involve exy.

“Is Neil responding to you now?” Renee asked as she dodged Andrew’s punch.

“Sometimes,” Andrew responded and then he paused to step back out of the range of Renee’s kick. “He’s a little shit, but I think he’s going along with the plan.”

Andrew managed to land a hit, but immediately took Renee’s fist to his cheek in response.

“Do you believe I’m really swapping bodies with him?” Andrew asked because he himself still wondered sometimes. “Or do you think it’s all in my head and nothing is going to happen at the banquet?”

“I know that the swapping is real,” Renee said with a certainty that Andrew did not feel himself.

“How?” He asked.

“You knew his phone number,” Renee said. “I texted Neil Josten and you responded while your body was in my line of sight.”

“I could have used a different phone,” Andrew pointed out. “I could have gotten Nicky or Aaron to send you that text to convince you.”

“Why would you do that?” Renee asked. “That’s a lot of effort to go to without you realizing and I do not think that you would go to that much effort to mess with me.”

Andrew mulled her words over. She had a point.

* * *

**Tuesday**

After Fox practice on Tuesday, Neil wanted to go back to the dorm, but Nicky had other plans.

“The banquet is in five days,” Nicky pointed out. “We need something to wear.”

Maybe it was because of Andrew’s medication, but Neil found himself laughing against his will. He had far more urgent things to worry about as the banquet came closer and closer and what Andrew would be wearing was at the absolute bottom of his list.


	5. Chapter 5

**Wednesday**

Wednesday, Andrew got to cut out of practice early and see Bee for the first time in two weeks. He had a lot going on that he potentially could talk about, but a lot more than he knew he had to keep secret.

At the start of their session, Bee made him cocoa as usual.

He has barely taken a sip when Bee asked, “So, are you still somebody else this week? Or are you Andrew?”

“Neil told you?” Andrew asked.

“Neil,” Bee said. “So that’s his name.”

“Do you think he is made up? Or a different version of me?” Andrew asked.

“I don’t know,” Bee admitted. Andrew far preferred that to if she had lied to humour him. “What do you think?”

Andrew shrugged. “At first I thought I was crazier than usual.”

“And now?”

“Either my brain is layers deep in delusions somehow no one else is noticed or I’ve been swapping bodies with a Raven for the better part of two weeks.”

* * *

**Thursday**

Neil had to go see Dr. Dobson during practice again during practice on Thursday.

“Why do I have to go on a Thursday?” Neil asked when Nicky made him leave early.

“I don’t know,” Nicky said. “You’re the one who made the appointment with her yesterday.”

* * *

Neil sat with hot chocolate in hand, watching the clock for when he eventually would be able to leave.

“Who are you today?” She asked.

Neil didn’t like that question. He never should have told her about the body swapping last time.

“Andrew,” he lied.

“You’re sure?” Dr. Dobson questioned.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Yesterday, you told me every morning switches off for whether you are Andrew or Neil,” she said. “Yesterday, you were also Andrew.”

“I’m always Andrew,” Neil lied.

Dr. Dobson watched him for a moment longer. “Is that so?”

“Yes.”

“How do you feel today, Andrew?” She asked.

“I don’t,” Neil said.

“What do you mean you don’t?” She asked. “Do you feel numb or exhausted or...?”

“I don’t feel anything,” Neil said. “I grin like an idiot but these meds don’t let me feel anything. Being stuck in this foggy mind is torture. I can’t think, let alone feel.”

“Tell me more about that.”

* * *

“I hate this,” Kevin said for the eighteenth time since they had walked into Tetsuji’s office.

“You already said that,” Andrew said. “If you did more looking and less talking, we could be out of here faster. You’re the one with experience breaking in here.”

“We’re going to get caught,” Kevin insisted.

“Your confidence in me is astounding,” Andrew deadpanned.

“I’m here, aren’t I?” Kevin asked. “But if Tetsuji finds out we’re in here, that’s it. We’re dead.”

“Would you rather stay here forever?” Andrew challenged. When Kevin said nothing, he added, “That’s what I thought. There’s no way Riko or Tetsuji will let either of us off of the team if we don’t have enough to force their hand.”

Kevin handed Andrew a piece of paper that proved Tetsuji had been paying money to one of his sketchier contacts. Andrew set it on the desk and took a picture of it, then sent it to his own phone.

“If Riko finds those on your phone, he’ll delete them and we’ll be worse off than if we didn’t bother,” Kevin pointed out.

“That’s why I’m not keeping them on my phone,” Andrew said.

Kevin frowned. “You can’t just send those to anyone.”

“I have a guy on the outside,” Andrew said. “I send them to him and delete them from my phone. Riko doesn’t find out. My guy keeps them until we need them when we get out and that’s all you need to know. Don’t you trust me?”

There was a pause a hint too long before Kevin said, “I have to.”

“Oh, Kevin,” Andrew said sarcastically. “That warms my heart. Really.”

“You’re such a dick,” Kevin insisted, but at least he wasn’t fluttering around quite so nervously anymore.

Andrew’s head whipped up at the sound of footsteps in the hallway. He stuck Neil’s phone in his pocket and made a futile attempt at not looking overwhelmingly guilty. At the very least, he would like whoever caught them not to know what they were doing.

Jean stood in the doorway and stared at them for a moment, then said something in French that Andrew did not understand.

Kevin looked to Andrew for help. Andrew blinked back at Jean.

“You should not be in here,” Jean said, this time in English. “What are you doing? You are going to get us all in trouble.”

Jean was Neil’s partner in the Nest which meant that when Jean got in trouble, so did Andrew and Neil, and vice versa. One advantage was that he had a vested interest in Neil not getting into trouble or caught, but Andrew had a feeling he wasn’t going to take an utter brush off so he chose his next words carefully. He would have to offer up just enough truth to keep him satisfied without putting their plan at greater risk by drawing him into it.

“We’re gathering information to blackmail Riko with,” Andrew said. He glanced in Kevin’s direction to make sure that he would not add any more information.

“You are blackmailing Riko?” Jean repeated doubtfully. “You are aware that is a terrible idea, are you not?”

“Turn around and pretend you didn’t see anything and we won’t tell him it was your idea,” Andrew threatened.

Jean lingered in the doorway anyway and looked like he was deep in thought with his brows furrowed and a crinkle between them.

“It would be easier to find evidence without getting caught with another set of hands,” Jean said in a measured tone.

Kevin’s eyes were still trained on Andrew. Andrew watched Jean closely, trying to judge whether it would be worth the risk to trust him with this portion of the plan.

“If we get caught, I will say that you two forced me,” Jean said. “And when you two blackmail him for whatever it is you are trying to get, I will deny any association with this and throw you both under the bus. But I would very much like to see Riko lose his power and be dragged down with us.”

“You take that side of the room,” Andrew said. “And say something if you hear more footsteps.”

* * *

**Friday**

Neil was relieved when he was in his own body for Friday’s game.

His performance in the game was far from perfect, but at least it was his own and he was allowed onto the court for both of his shifts.

More than anything, Neil was glad that he was not trapped in Andrew’s body to go through his withdrawal like he’d had to last week.

* * *

**Saturday**

“Where are my meds?” Neil questioned.

With Andrew’s memory, he remembered perfectly clearly leaving the bottle on the kitchen counter that morning, but it had disappeared. Neil could not bear the thought of going through Andrew’s withdrawal again and he wasn’t leaving for Columbia until he found that bottle.

“I’ve got them,” Nicky said.

“So give them to me,” Neil said.

“It’s Saturday,” Nicky pointed out. “I’m not falling for that again.”

“Falling for what?” Neil asked.

“Last time the withdrawal was too much and I gave in when you asked, you gave me shit,” Nicky pointed out. “Let’s go. The sooner we get in the car, the sooner we’ll be at Sweetie’s and you can take the edge off.”

* * *

The drive to Columbia dragged out unbearably. Neil tried to sleep until they got there, but he still had to get Nicky to pull over so that he could retch out the side of the car three times.

By the time they got to Sweetie’s, Neil had broken out into a cold sweat and his hands were shaking.

As they sat and waited for a table, Nicky went over to the salad bar and grabbed a handful of cracker packets that he dropped in Neil’s lap.

Neil tore through them in a matter of minutes.

Andrew liked sweets, so when they got a table and Nicky ordered sundaes for them all, Neil forced himself to eat his.

When they paid, the waitress left packets of yellow powder under the bill.

Aaron pocketed them, but when they made it to the car, he pulled one of the packets out and tossed it at Neil.

Neil stared down at it. He couldn’t ask what it was because obviously Andrew should already know, but it was clear it was some kind of drug from the shady dealing and the amount of money Aaron had given the waitress for their three sundaes.

Neil never drank or did drugs, but clearly Andrew did. Nicky and Aaron were both expecting him to down whatever was in that packet and Andrew’s withdrawal was so bad that Neil tore the packet open and dumped it into his mouth before he could think too hard about what could happen.

The powder was salty and sweet and Neil wanted to spit it back out, but he didn’t.

He swallowed and hoped that whatever the drugs did, they didn’t make him slip and say something stupid about himself, or at the very least that Nicky and Aaron wouldn’t believe him if he did.

* * *

While Nicky parked the car, Neil followed Aaron into Eden’s. The bouncers acted like they knew them, so Neil offered a small nod on his way by.

Inside, Andrew followed Aaron to a small table upstairs. Aaron sat down, so Neil did too, but apparently that was the wrong answer.

“Aren’t you going to get the drinks?” Aaron asked.

Neil glanced around, uncertain which direction a person would even go in to get drinks, but when he spotted a crowd that a few people were pushing out of with fresh drinks in hand, he stood up from the table and left Aaron to save it.

He had no idea what he was going to order, but that was a whole other problem.

He expected to have more time to figure that out, considering the giant line of people waiting to get their drinks, but a bartender glanced at him immediately and finished pouring drinks for a a group of girls, then headed straight for Neil.

“The usual?” The bartender asked.

Neil nodded. At least that was one less possible way to screw up. Neil didn’t plan on drinking and impairing his judgment any further, but it was easier to just take whatever the usual was.

“My break’s in half an hour,” the bartender said as he grabbed a tray.

“Good for you,” Neil deadpanned.

Bartender seemed to know what he was doing, but Neil still thought that he should watch the drink he was pouring instead of trying to gauge Andrew’s reaction as he asked, “Should I expect you in the back?”

_ “Andrew’s gay.” _

Renee’s words echoed in Neil’s head and suddenly it all snapped into place.

Andrew voluntarily put himself through horrifying withdrawal every Saturday so he could have a clear head to hook up with this bartender.

“Not tonight.”

Neil half expected a confrontation, but the bartender just shrugged.

“Suit yourself.”

* * *

Kevin’s private night practice with Neil was an absolute joke Saturday night. He made Andrew change into Neil’s equipment and got them all set up for drills and then instead of running drills with Neil, Kevin said, “I don’t think I can do this.”

“You run this drill every day,” Andrew pointed out. “It’s not that difficult.”

“If it’s not that difficult, then why do you still trip over your own feet?” Kevin challenged. After a moment, he added in a quieter voice, “That’s not what I meant. I meant tomorrow.”

“You don’t have to be able to do anything,” Andrew said. “All you have to do is follow me out of the building. Can you handle walking?”

“You don’t understand,” Kevin said. “I’m terrified of the plan failing, but I’m just as terrified of it working.”

“I told you I will get you on another team that will play you,” Andrew insisted. “It is not better to stay here. It is just a more familiar fear, but your life is never going to get better if you don’t take a risk. You can walk out of here. You just have to choose to.”

“Okay,” Kevin said.

“Okay?” Andrew asked.

“Maybe,” Kevin said.

That would have to be good enough.


	6. Chapter 6

**Sunday**

On the bus on the way to the banquet, Andrew texted Neil.

_ Is Kevin ready? _

Neil responded an uncharacteristic three minutes later.

_ He’s freaking out. I’m trying to keep him from acting weird and tipping anyone off. _

Andrew sent back one more text before he put his phone back in his pocket.

_ Calm him down. No one gets out if he blows this. _

* * *

“Riko is going to be looking for you any second,” Neil pointed out. “I need you to get it together. Now.”

Kevin sat on the floor with his knees against his chest in the midst of a panic attack, and Neil had no idea how to help him.

“Just breathe,” he said. “Or something. I don’t know. But calm down. In a few hours, we’ll be out for good.”

Kevin tried to catch his breath while Neil kept watch. His breathing had just returned to something resembling a normal rate when Riko showed up in the doorway.

“There you are,” he said, looking straight past Neil at Kevin. “I have been looking all over for you. What are you doing?”

“I was just making sure Nathaniel was dressed properly,” Kevin said. “You know he doesn’t put any effort into his appearance and I didn’t want him making us look bad.”

Riko glanced between them for a moment and then seemed satisfied as he said, “Alright. Now let’s go. You do not need to waste any more of your time on the likes of him.”

* * *

The banquet was in full swing when Andrew’s text came.

_ Distraction coming in 5 minutes. Be at the bus in 10 or we leave without you. _

Neil already knew what the distraction would be. He had to be, in case he ended up in Andrew’s body instead of his own when it came time for the escape. Kevin didn’t. Kevin didn’t even know that Neil was working with Andrew Minyard, or he probably would have not put his trust into Neil’s plan which was fairly ironic considering Andrew was the one who had made the plan and talked Kevin into it in the first place.

“Be ready to leave in ten minutes,” Neil said in French.

Kevin blanched. Jean and Riko’s heads turned for totally different reasons.

Jean hadn’t heard about the plan before. He’d helped find material to blackmail Riko with no problem as long as he could throw them under the bus and make Riko miserable at the same time. If Jean wanted to leave with them, he would have to make up his mind awfully fast. Neil figured Jean deserved to break out just as much after all the help he had given them. Jean was a friend too, if such a thing could exist in the Nest. Now that the opportunity to escape was there, Neil didn’t care that Andrew’s plan only involved him and Kevin. If they succeeded and left Jean behind, Neil knew that Jean would be lucky if he lived through Riko’s anger.

If Jean had been somewhere else, Neil would have left him behind. Inviting Jean into the plan was a liability they hadn’t been able to afford before, but he happened to be in the right place at the right time now.

“You too,” Neil added in French. “We have a plan. If it works, we’re getting out of here. Are you in?”

“Speak English,” Riko snapped.

Jean didn’t dare to speak French in front of an already angry Riko, but Neil caught him nod when Riko’s back was turned to him.

* * *

“Hey, Nicky,” Andrew said. “I’m bored.”

Nicky’s whole body and attention turned to him immediately.

“Why don’t you go dance with your date?” Nicky asked.

“Renee is not my date and I do not dance,” Andrew said. “I had something else in mind. I’m going to get us kicked out so we can go home. Give Coach a heads up and make sure he gets the team onto the bus fast.”

“How much of a head start do you want?” Nicky asked.

“None,” Andrew said and with that he stalked off in the direction of the Ravens.

He didn’t look back to check if Nicky was doing as he was told. He knew he would be.

* * *

Neil watched as Nicky finished talking to the Foxes’ coach. Wymack frowned and then he, Dan, and Abby began the process of discretely gathering the rest of the team.

Andrew was headed toward them. Neil knew that he was going to cause a scene to piss of Riko. Part of him wished that he was in Andrew’s body so that he could let Riko know just what he thought of him.

Neil expected Andrew to come right up to them, instead Andrew stepped onto a chair and then onto one of the tables.

He faced out toward the crowded dance floor instead of them as he announced, “The real reason Kevin Day doesn’t play anymore is because Riko Moriyama’s fragile masculinity can’t handle the fact that Kevin would get more attention than him all over again. Imagine having a sense of self worth so fragile that you are too afraid to play beside a player using his non-dominant hand because he is still probably better than you.”

It didn’t take long for Riko to fall for the bait. He stormed over and yanked Andrew off of the table. Neil would have loved to stay and watch Andrew fight Riko, and hopefully kick his ass, but they had a bus to catch and all this would be a waste if they stood there and watched.

“Let’s go,” Neil said in French.

Jean didn’t have to be told twice. Kevin stood there staring at Riko as he and Andrew swung at each other, so Neil grabbed onto Kevin by the sleeve and tugged him along with him.

“Where are we going?” Jean questioned.

“The Fox bus,” Neil said.

“What?” Kevin demanded and stopped dead in his tracks. This was why Neil hadn’t told him that detail beforehand. Kevin doubted their ability to escape enough without their plan relying on the generosity of the last place team and the only player who ever told Kevin Day to fuck off when he tried to recruit them.

Jean looked like his confidence in the plan was wavering as well.

“I don’t have time to talk you into this all over again,” Neil said. “Move. Someone on the team is expecting us.”

* * *

Security dragged Andrew off of Riko and he thrashed against their hold until Wymack ordered, “Let him go. I’ll deal with him.”

“Leave now,” Riko snapped at Andrew. Security had let go of him too, but grabbed onto him again as he lunged toward Andrew again.

“Oh no,” Andrew deadpanned. “We have to leave a banquet full of exy players? Too bad. How will I ever survive?”

“Andrew,” Wymack said in a warning tone. “Let’s go. The team is already on the bus.”

Andrew glanced around and saw no sign of Neil or Kevin, so he turned around and followed Wymack toward the doors.

“You know,” Wymack hissed once they had pushed their way outside. “If you wanted to leave, you could have just said something instead of punching Riko Moriyama in the face.”

That might have been true if Andrew hadn’t needed to get Neil and Kevin out without Riko realizing that they were missing. He figured Riko must know by now which meant that they didn’t have much time to get out of there before Riko would come looking outside for them.

“Where would be the fun in that?” Andrew asked because he figured it would get Wymack off his back.

Wymack shook his head.

The bus was in view now. Andrew could hear arguing from across the parking lot. Apparently, the Ravens had made it on board.

* * *

“I thought you said they were waiting for us,” Kevin snapped at Neil in French. “Oh, this is just great, Neil. Perfect. Now, we’re all going to get in trouble for trying to escape because you thought the Foxes would take us in for some unimaginable reason. You’ve really lost your mind this time.”

Neil didn’t miss the way that Kevin called him Neil on autopilot when they were away from Riko and Tetsuji. He thought that all of this would be worth it just to not be called Nathaniel anymore, if Andrew would just show up and sort this out already.

“He’s coming,” Neil shot back in French. “The plan will work.”

“I’m not going back,” Jean said. “You don’t get to tell me we’re getting out, just to have me dragged back and punished for your idiocy. I would rather die.”

“Stop speaking French and get the fuck off our bus,” Aaron snapped. “It’s not our fault Andrew punched your asshole of a teammate.”

“We’re leaving,” Allison said. “Go the fuck away or I’ll throw you off our bus.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Kevin argued. At least his stubbornness was working in Neil’s favour for the moment, even if Kevin’s faith in him was at an all time low.

Allison lunged toward him, but Neil stepped in front of him.

“Andrew told us to come here,” he insisted.

“Well, in that case I’ll throw you off myself,” Matt insisted as he rose from his seat.

“Of fucking course he did,” Aaron grumbled. “Why wouldn’t he invite Ravens onto our bus and tell no one? That’s just fucking perfect.”

Kevin turned on Neil with an incredulous look and demanded, “ _ Andrew _ is the reason that we’re here? We’re even more doomed than I thought.”

“He’s getting us out,” Neil insisted.

“You have a lot of trust in him, considering you’ve never met him,” Kevin insisted.

Matt was still inching closer and Allison was gripping Neil’s arm now.

Neil opened his mouth to argue, but then the door to the bus opened.

“Let go of him,” Andrew said. “I invited them. They’re leaving with us.”

“You’re insane,” Seth accused. “Like actually fucking padded walls straight jacket nuts.”

“We are not taking Ravens,” Dan insisted. “Go spy on some other team that might be actual competition.”

“They aren’t Ravens anymore,” Andrew said. “They’re joining our team.”

“Yeah, right,” Nicky insisted with a laugh. “Why would they do that?”

“Tetsuji is a tyrant and he lets his sadist nephew do whatever he wants,” Neil said. “We’re escaping.”

“They signed a contract,” Dan pointed out. “You can’t just kidnap them and make them Foxes halfway through the year.”

“I have a plan for that,” Andrew said. “But first we have to get out of here before Riko finds them.”

Wymack just stood there staring at them. Neil was suddenly certain they were going to be sent back. Andrew had carried out his plan just as promised but Wymack was going to kick them off his bus anyway.

He stared at Kevin for a long moment before he said, “Your mother would rise from the grave just to kick my ass if I didn’t help you, so take a seat.”

Neil let out a sigh relief as he found a seat on the bus and Wymack started up the bus. This was really happening. They were really getting out.


	7. Chapter 7

**Monday**

“Turn your fucking alarm off,” Aaron groaned the next morning.

Andrew opened his eyes confused. He had been in his own body the day before and he and Neil had been swapping bodies every day. According to the pattern, Andrew should have woken up in Neil’s body at Abby’s house.

Instead, he was in his own dorm, listening to Nicky’s beeping alarm tone.

“If I turn it off, none of us are going to practice,” Nicky mumbled into his pillow. “Leave it on. I’ll get up in a minute.”

“Hit snooze,” Aaron said. “At least let us sleep ten more minutes instead of listening to that sound.”

Andrew got out of his bed and turned Nicky’s alarm off himself.

Nicky opened his eyes and blinked at him in confusion. Aaron was staring at him now too. Andrew was aware that it was uncharacteristic for him to be first up for practice, but Andrew had a lot of work to do to make sure that Kevin and Neil would be safe there.

* * *

“The y’re a part of the team now which means they’re moving into the dorms,” Wymack warned at the gym in the morning the morning after the banquet. “You guys need to figure out where you’re making room for them or else I’ll take back the keys to one and you’ll all share a dorm.”

The former Ravens had stayed at Abby’s the night before, but they couldn’t stay there forever.

“We’re taking Kevin,” Andrew said without hesitation. He glanced in Matt and Seth’s direction as he added, “You can take the other two.”

Clearly, Andrew was planning to keep his promise to Kevin, even outside of the Nest.

* * *

“Out,” Andrew said the moment they were in the dorm with Kevin.

“But-“ Nicky tried.

“ _ Out _ ,” Andrew repeated.

“This is our dorm too,” Aaron grumbled, but he headed for the door anyway.

Nicky moved with him and, after a beat, Kevin went to follow them but Andrew put a stop to that.

“Not you.”

“Good luck,” Aaron muttered with one last glance in Kevin’s direction before he closed the door behind himself.

Kevin looked as anxious as he did standing in front of Riko or Tetsuji. Andrew thought that was a little ungrateful after Andrew had helped get him out of the Nest and away from the Moriyamas, but at least Kevin had some survival instincts.

“You’re nervous,” Andrew said. “Smart.”

Kevin stared back at him for a moment then lost his nerve and broke the eye contact. He stared out the window as he asked, “Why did you want me in your dorm?”

“I have a deal for you,” Andrew said as he sat down on top of his desk. “I am the reason you made it to the bus and out of Evermore. I am the one who kept all of that evidence you,Neil, and Jean gathered. I will use it against Riko to make sure he and Tetsuji let you sign to this team. But that does not mean that they are going to be happy about the corner we drove them into. You are free, but you are not in the clear. You know that. It’s why you’re so nervous now. You made it out of the Nest as a follower and now you’re a scared little Raven with no partner. You are all alone in the world with no one to protect you.”

“What’s your point?” Kevin asked. His tone was guarded. He looked angry, as if he thought Andrew had simply invited him there to taunt him and dangle what Kevin owed him in front of him.

“You need someone to protect you,” Andrew said. “And I will do everything in my power to keep you safe and keep you from running back to the familiarity of your precious Ravens. For a price.”

Kevin had agreed to let Andrew keep him safe before, but he didn’t know that. He thought he had made all his deals through Neil.

Kevin gritted his teeth together. “What price?”

“This team is broken into two groups,” Andrew said. “Us and them. If you are one of us, I will do everything in my power to keep you safe. If you are one of them, well then I couldn’t care less what happens to you.”

Kevin’s brow furrowed in confusion.

“That’s it?” He asked. “You want me to sit with you instead of whoever they are?”

“Stick with us. Know your place. And I’ll protect you,” Andrew said. “Can you handle that?”

Kevin still looked confused, but after a moment he nodded his head.

“Smart choice,” Andrew said. “Now say it.”

“Say what?” Kevin asked.

“Your promise,” Andrew said. “I promise to keep you safe and keep you off of the Ravens if you stick with us and learn your place in our group. Your turn.”

“I’ll stick with you and your group. I’ll learn my place,” Kevin said. When Andrew didn’t react, he added, “I promise.”

“You are going to do just fine here,” Andrew said as he headed toward the door to let Aaron and Nicky back into the dorm.

“Hold on,” Kevin said and Andrew paused halfway to the door. “Who is us?”

“Me,” Andrew said. “Aaron. Nicky. Neil. And now you.”

* * *

Andrew left Kevin alone in the dorm and went up to the roof for a private phone call. He did not need Kevin listening in and freaking out. It would sully the credibility of Andrew’s threat.

Up on the roof, Andrew dialed Riko’s number that he had gotten from Neil’s phone and waited as it rang.

“Who is this?” Riko questioned in lieu of a hello.

“Andrew Minyard,” he said. “I know that you are pissed that your perfect court all ran away because you’re so unbearable and you want to lash out to punish them, but before you do anything, know that I have a hell of a lot of evidence ready to release to the media the instant that I think anything fishy is happening.”

“You are bluffing,” Riko insisted.

“Am I?” Andrew asked. “I have pictures of all kinds of documents linking you and your uncle to crimes. I have a video of Kevin outside of last year’s holiday banquet clutching a bloodied hand to his chest when his injury was supposed to have come from a skiing trip. I know how much you Moriyamas value your public image. Tell your uncle you let them sign transfer to PSU with no consequences and you can say whatever the hell you want about it to the media. Try to start something and I will end it.”

* * *

For a moment, Neil was instinctively alarmed when a knock came at his dorm room door at night. He made no move to answer the door. Seth was out who knew were. Matt was in the bathroom. Neil sat perfectly still on the couch and hoped that if he did not move, whoever it was would give up and assume that no one was home.

“Neil,” Kevin shouted through the door and then he knocked again.

Neil felt relief course through him at the fact that it was just Kevin and he was theoretically safe. He got up and left the book he was pretending to read to avoid having to hold a conversation with Matt on the couch as he headed to answer the door.

“What do you want?” Neil asked the moment Kevin was in his line of sight.

Kevin did not at all seem perturbed by Neil’s greeting.

“Andrew’s taking us to the court for night practice,” Kevin said. “Don’t tell me you’re going to start skipping now that we don’t have to sneak around anymore.”

“Not a chance,” Neil said. He didn’t bother waiting for Matt to return to tell him where he had gone. “Let’s go.”

* * *

Andrew drove Neil and Kevin to the court for their stupid night practice, but he didn’t bother changing. There was no way that they would convince him to participate. Kevin’s training had been awful enough when it had been necessary in Neil’s body.

As they practiced, Andrew found a spot on the bleachers and got comfortable. A dim part of his brain wondered if he would wake up from his nap in Neil’s body, trapped in the torture that was Kevin’s drills after all, but just as he had every time he had woken since the banquet, Andrew woke up in his own body when Kevin slammed the door of the inner court shut at the end of the practice.

* * *

**Tuesday**

For a moment on Tuesday morning, Neil thought that he had woken up in Andrew’s body again. His new dorm room was identical to Andrew’s and it wasn’t until Seth cursed and turned his alarm off that Neil realized that he wasn’t in Andrew’s dorm after all.

Neil Josten was officially a Fox with his own dorm room at PSU. He didn’t need to wake up in Andrew’s body anymore, and it was starting to seem like maybe he wouldn’t again.

* * *

“We don’t need more backliners,” Allison complained. “That’s about the only thing that we have enough of. We need strikers. Dan’s been playing as one. Since we lost Janie, her and Seth have been playing full games. I’ve been playing full halves. Renee’s been playing half in goal and half as a dealer. But this is just what we need. Two new backliners and a glorified benchwarmer.”

“Our stats are a hell of a lot better than your team’s,” Kevin insisted.

“Can you even play?” Seth questioned. “Stats don’t count when they’re from before that busted hand.”

“Kevin is a better striker right-handed than you could ever be,” Neil snapped at him.

“If he’s so great, then why has he been sitting on the bench the whole season?” Allison demanded.

“Your team would be lucky to have one of us,” Jean pointed out. “You need players bad enough to take anyone, and we are not just anyone.”

“Well, maybe we shouldn’t take you,” Allison insisted. “I wasn’t a part of that decision.”

Neil could tell that Kevin was sick of talking and was itching to give his new racquet a try.

“You think we’re not good enough for your team?” Kevin questioned. “We’ll show you. Your team needs a backliner like Jean.”

“We need strikers worse,” Dan pointed out.

“We’ll even give you the advantage,” Kevin said. “Me and Neil will play as strikers with Jean and Nicky as backliners. Renee can be our dealer. You get Dan and Seth as strikers. Allison as a dealer. Aaron and Matt as backliners. No goalies.”

Andrew took that cue to go sleep on the bleachers without hesitation. Kevin probably had no idea the favour he had just done Andrew by sitting him.

“ _ He’s  _ going to play as a striker?” Seth asked with disgust in his tone. “What? Like it’s so easy. That’s great. I’ll have a cripple and a backliner playing my position.”

Neil had never been allowed to play as anything but a backliner on the court, but since Kevin had been benched he had been practicing extra hard and extra long late at night, practicing playing right handed and training Neil privately.

Kevin took his position on the court, and Neil and Jean quickly followed his example.

“Your team can start with the ball,” Kevin said as the rest of the players took their places. “You’re going to need all the advantages you can get.”

It was an arrogant comment, but Kevin was right. Allison started off with the ball, but Jean intercepted her pass to Seth. He sent the ball to Kevin and under a minute into the scrimmage, Kevin had scored on the empty goal.

“Your ball again,” Kevin said as he tossed it over to Allison again.

The next few plays went the same. Matt and Aaron shifted to try to block Kevin specifically when the score hit 5-0, but Jean sent the ball up to Neil instead and he scored before either of the backliners got anywhere near him.

Allison started the next play with a pass to Dan, who slipped past Nicky and scored the first goal for the other team.

“Your ball,” Dan said as she tossed it to Renee.

Renee passed to Neil and seconds later, the score was 7-1. Allison cursed and her team looked as frustrated as her.

“You should have been there!” Seth shouted across the court. “Why the fuck was no one covering him?”

“Well, maybe if you could catch the ball, we wouldn’t be down by six points!” Aaron shouted back. “Worry about your own position.”

“Fuck you!” Seth shouted back. “I’m not the problem.”

“Oh, sure,” Nicky said. “The strikers are never the problem. Blame everything on the backliners because you’re  _ never  _ the problem.”

“Shut up,” Seth snapped. “You’re not even on this team. Mind your own fucking business.”

“You’re just pissed because he’s right,” Aaron said.

“Stop arguing,” Kevin said. “It’s your ball. Let’s go.”

The other team completely fell apart after that. They were too busy fighting with each other to form a coherent play. Twenty minutes later, Wymack called the scrimmage to an end with a final score of 32-1.

“So you can play,” Allison said. “So what? Why should we trust you on our team? Why should we believe that you’re actually here to play on the worst team in either division? Who is to say that you’re not just going to jump back to the Ravens the second you get court time and prove you can still play? I’m not interested in being a pawn in your little game.”

“Tell them,” Neil said in French when Kevin said nothing. “Tell them he’s your father. It’s the only thing that explains why we would join this team.”

“You are the one that made us come here,” Kevin retorted in French. “Why don’t you tell them about your secret deal with Andrew?”

“We could have joined any team still,” Neil retorted, even though he did not want to join any other team.

Kevin sighed and switched to English. He held up his left hand as he told them, “Because Riko smashed my hand with a hammer so that I wouldn’t be better than him anymore and then forced me to sit on the bench for a year, all while publicly mourning my stolen potential. I’m not going back to the Ravens. I’m going to prove that I’m still better than him by dragging you and your team to finals and beating them. So can we stop wasting time talking and go back to actually practicing now?”

* * *

**Friday**

Friday, Neil woke up in his own body just as he had every day since the morning of the banquet.

It was his first game as a Fox and his first game as a striker since Millport. Seth still had not warmed up to the fact that Neil and Kevin would be playing his position, but at least they had subs now.

Their opponent was not a particularly good team. In fact, they only ranked two spots higher than the Foxes did.

The game was a mess, but at least Andrew was in his own body playing goal. Between Andrew’s ability (even playing in his usual half-hearted manner) Jean’s skill as a backliner, and Kevin and Neil helping out as strikers, they managed to scrape by with a measly lead of two points.

“I can’t believe we won,” Nicky said in awe after the game. “Like we actually won. I didn’t even know that was a possibility.”

Kevin scowled over at him as he insisted, “I cannot believe we won either. We got lucky. That point gap was atrocious, and none of you know how to work together as a team.”

“We won,” Jean said. “On this team that is nothing short of a miracle.”

“Lighten up, buzzkills,” Allison insisted. “We actually won a game, for the first time this season. Bitch and moan about what we need to fix at practice. For now, I am going to celebrate the fact that we might actually stand a chance at making it to the second half of this season and I am not letting you ruin that.”

Kevin didn’t look happy, but he didn’t argue either. Neil could tell that he was silently calculating just how much the team needed to work on and what they would need to focus on first as they headed into the change rooms.

Neil knew that Kevin would make the Foxes a hell of a lot better. He knew that their teamwork was rusty to say the least. It had been anything but a perfect game, but they were Foxes now and they had won and Neil got to go back to the Foxes’ private shower stall away from all eyes and he was far too busy riding that high to let the challenges the team would face before they could work together properly bring him down.

* * *

**Saturday**

On Saturday, they went to Eden’s as always, except this time they brought Kevin and Neil along with them. Andrew didn’t need to test them anymore. He had already promised to protect them. They had already put their trust in him and it was the reason that they were standing there instead of stuck underground back at Evermore. Kevin was already proving perfectly loyal to Andrew, nearly attached to his side at all times. They were a part of his group now and that meant they were coming with him.

Jean had never been a part of Andrew’s plan and Renee had taken him in as one of hers. Andrew had left him behind. He was probably off drinking at some shitty bar just off campus with the upperclassmen.

Usually, when Aaron and Nicky went off dancing, Andrew was left at the table on his own. Usually, that suited Andrew’s agenda well when he intended to sneak off with Roland no questions asked, but tonight Andrew thought he wanted to change things up and stick to the table. He wasn’t entirely certain why he was putting himself through withdrawal not to sneak off with Roland.

Tonight, Neil and Kevin both lingered. Neil didn’t drink, but Kevin drank enough to make up for it. Andrew contemplated cutting him off, but Kevin was fresh out of Hell, and Andrew figured there were worse ways he could cope for now. Eventually, Kevin had enough to lower his inhibitions and he went off to find Aaron and Nicky. Andrew left the table long enough to watch over the railing to make sure that Kevin found Nicky before he came back to the table and it was just him and Neil.

“You’re sober,” Neil accused.

“Practicing for the withdrawal I’m going to have to put up with soon,” Andrew shrugged. “Bee’s fighting to get me off my drugs early. Apparently, something I said about them fogging up my head got through to her.”

“I know you go off your drugs every time you come here,” Neil pointed out.

“Congratulations,” Andrew deadpanned. “Would you like an award?”

“It’s for Roland, isn’t it?” Neil asked. “You get sober so that your mind is clear to be with him.”

Neil wasn’t wrong, but tonight was different.

“I’m not in the mood to sneak off with Roland tonight,” Andrew said.

He resented the fact that he had Neil on his mind too much to think about Roland and he resented the fact that Neil asking about his potential hookup for the night piqued his interest.

Andrew was very aware of how close Neil’s stool was to his. It had made sense when there had been five of them crammed at one little table, but now that it was just the two of them the mere inches between them felt loaded.

Even without the drugs, Andrew’s judgment was clouded by Neil’s presence. Without thinking it through, Andrew leaned closer and hooked Neil’s chin with his fingers to angle him for a kiss. This was different than kissing Roland and Andrew was surprised by and terrified of his own desperation.

By the time Andrew realized what he was doing, forcing himself onto Neil, it had already been going on for far too long.

Andrew pulled back and to his surprise, Neil moved forward as if following the disappearing contact for a moment before he too pulled back and opened his eyes.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” Andrew said.

At least he was sober and Neil had not been drinking either, but there was something terrifying about the fact that he had pushed the limits like that without being drunk or medicated.

“Why not?” Neil asked.

“You did not agree to that kiss,” Andrew said. “I forced myself on you in public and it was a stupid mistake that won’t happen again.”

“I didn’t mind,” Neil said. “If you want, you can kiss me again.”

Andrew blinked at him for a moment and then told him, “Not here. Not with people watching. I need a smoke. Are you coming?”

“Yes,” Neil said.

Andrew weaved his way through the crowds to the back door and outside.

When they made it out there, he contemplated lighting up a cigarette to calm his nerves. He took the carton out, opened it, and snapped it shut again.

“Yes or no?” Andrew asked as he took a step closer to Neil.

It took Neil a moment to realize what Andrew was asking and then he agreed, “Yes.”

“Your hands stay in your pockets,” Andrew said. “You stay against the wall. You move at all and we go back inside and forget this ever happened. Got it?”

“Yes,” Neil said and he pressed himself against the wall even further.

Andrew watched him for a moment longer and then kissed him again.

**Author's Note:**

> **A/N: This fic can be read as a stand-alone story and you can believe that this is their happy end if you would like, but there will also be a sequel at some point that takes place in the second half of the season with Andrew and Neil sorting things out more with them both at PSU and with how the former Ravens adjust to their new team.**


End file.
